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Friday, January 29, 2010

I finally watched a film I had wanted to watch for sometime, Grey Gardens. It's the story of Edith "Big Edie" Bouvier Beale and her daughter "Little Edie". Big Eddie was the aunty of Jackie Kennedy Onassis. Grey Gardens is a house located in East Hampton that Big Edie moved her family into in the 1920's. In 1934 Edith's husband left her and she let the house fall into ruin as she didn't have the means financially or physically to maintain the house. Big Edie continued to live in the house with her daughter Little Edie and her many, many cats!

The original Grey Garden house

An aerial view of the grounds of Grey Gardens

In 1972, a documentary was made of the Edie's. It documented the women who were facing eviction if they didn't clean up the house according to code. Jackie Kennedy Onassis and her sister stepped in to help repair the home and the Edie's were saved from eviction. At the time the house had no running water, no electricity and toilets that didn't work. It was also home to a large family of cats and raccoons.

The house almost hidden by the untamed, heavily overgrown garden

The real Little Edie standing in the dining room amongst thousands of piled up cat food tinsThe same dining room shown before as depicted in the filmLove the red chinese Chippendale dining chairs

The HBO film Grey Gardens stars Jessica Lange as Big Edie and Drew Barrymore as little Edie. They, in particular Drew gave really great performances playing these eccentric, reclusive women who live their life out in squalor.

The house as shown in the film, an exact replica

Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange in the film Grey Gardens

The real Little Edie in her younger days before she lost all her hair

Drew Barrymore as an older Little Edie

Big Edie died in 1977 and Little Edie was forced to sell Grey Gardens. She sold it to Sally Quinn and Ben Bradlee of the Washington Post. Little Edie sold it to them as they were the only ones who promised not to tear down the house, instead restore it to it's former beauty.

Thursday, January 21, 2010

One of my guilty pleasures is The Rachel Zoe Project. Some of you may watch it, some may not! For those who don't, Rachel Zoe is the stylist the stars. She is probably best known for turning Nicole Richie around to become a very stylish girl (well I think so anyway). The show is on Foxtel and is should I say interesting, but I love it. It's follows Rachel and her styling expeditions with her assistants Taylor and Brad. It's so LA and full of crazy sayings - BA-NA-NAS

Anyway I love her old house (she now lives in a condo in LA). I would love to live in the Hollywood Hills in a great house and this is what I kind of imagine.

Monday, January 18, 2010

My quote has come in for my kitchen! It was perhaps a little more than I expected. So instead of rushing into it and to let myself get on top financially, I have decided to make some changes to the kitchen I have and live with it a bit longer. Oh the perils of reno's!

I will change out the sink and tap, change all door handles and hinges, paint the tiles and that should help freshen things up for me a little bit and I'll be happy to continue using it - for now.

But for now I will continue to dream of my ideal kitchen for my first little place.

Friday, January 15, 2010

I'm excited! Yesterday I had the kitchen guy come by and look at my kitchen to see what we can do to make it a beautiful kitchen. He has gone away to do up the plan (and the quote of course!!) so I am anxiously awaiting for it all to arrive in my inbox.

As you can see from the below pics, my kitchen is in desperate need of a pretty makeover. This is the kitchen in it's orginal state before I started to reno. Behind the facade it needs alot of TLC. A kitchen is a place to be clean, fresh and well did I mention clean? No matter how much I have scrubbed it, it will just never feel clean. The thought of preparing food in there just makes me feel ill.

Is it the worst kitchen I've seen - well no! But as this is my first little place and everything else is new, I just have to have a new kitchen!

Yuck, it looks much worse in person. It's like a pale pinkyish colour, handles all rusted and I won't even go near the oven!

Thursday, January 14, 2010

Recently I headed over to Perth to work for a couple of months. The experience was........great. Perth is a beautiful place and I felt I needed to post about it after speaking with one of my Perth friends today, let's just call her "Miss OC"!!! You see Miss OC thinks my blog is "funny" and if I didn't know Miss OC I would be offended! But it was actually Miss OC who drove me all around Perth showing me the beautiful houses in Perth, introduced me to one of my now favourite furniture and homewares stores Empire (see pic below) plus many more and asked me on a regular basis what she should do with her own First Little Place! Got the lights sorted out yet Miss OC?? You see I know Miss OC secretly LOVES my blog and can't wait for it to arrive in her inbox :)

Keep reading the blog Miss OC, you might get some ideas on all this random stuff xx

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

One of my dearest friends, Sam is an amazing photographer (and fellow interior design enthusiast plus horse lover). In reponse to my last post, he sent me these beautiful photo's of horses that he has taken. I'm thinking these ones will take pride of place on my walls, I love them.

I LOVE these 2 images I found of these horses that I can't wait to frame and put up in my house.

I love horses and they do remind me of being a little girl. When I was little I had a Barbie horse which I galloped around so much, one of it's legs broke off :( It was a beautiful Palamino. My grandpa promised me when I was younger that when I pass year 12, he would buy me a horse (he had a farm see) Yes it was many moons ago since year 12 but I am still waiting for my horse! One day when I live in the country in my dream house and with my own family, I will get my horse.

So long since I've gone riding, maybe that's on my to do list for 2010.

I don't know where yet, but I can't wait to find a place for them and you can see why I want to put them up.

Sunday, January 10, 2010

I know I've been slack posting about my new place since moving in. Well not much has been happening. There's still things to do of course, but it's just not happening at the moment :(

I have decided to get a new sofa! As you may remember a couple of posts back, my living area isn't to scale - it's really out. I need a longer sofa as mine currently is only a 2 seater. It's a very good sofa, the first sofa I bought when I moved out of home which I recently reupholstered. It has done me very well and moved 3 states in it's life time. But I think it's time to bid it farewell.

I have chosen to replace it with theKarlstad 3 seat sofa from Ikea. I'm on a tight budget so that is a factor, but I actually like the simple shape of it. I think I will get a slip cover made for it though in the grey linen. What do you think??